The League of Night and Fog (51 page)

“The car in the parking lot. Is it hers?”

“No. You said you’re
searching
for her?”

“I haven’t seen her in three weeks. Does the car belong to Yusuf Habib?”

As thunder again rumbled, Father Chen nodded.

“Then I expect Erika to arrive very soon, and I’m not here to cause trouble. I’m trying to stop it.”

A buzzer sounded. Frowning, Father Chen pressed a button. The image on the monitor changed to a view of the lobby. Saul felt blood rush to his heart as a camera showed Erika stepping from the rain into the lobby. Even in black-and-white, she was gorgeous, her long dark hair tied back in a ponytail, her cheekbones strong but elegant. Like him, she wore running shoes and jeans, but in place of his leather coat, she had a rain slicker, water dripping from it.

Saul was out of the office before Father Chen could rise from his chair. In the brightly lit lobby, Erika heard Saul’s urgently approaching footsteps on the brick floor and swung protectively, hardly relaxing when she saw who it was.

She pointed angrily. “I told you not to come after me.”

“I didn’t.”

“Then what the hell are you doing here?”

“I didn’t follow you. I followed
Habib.”
Saul turned toward Father Chen. “My wife and I need a place where we can talk.”

“The refectory is empty.” The priest indicated the corridor behind them and a door on the left, opposite his office.

Saul and Erika stared at each other. Impatient, she marched past him and through the doorway.

Following, Saul turned on the overhead fluorescent lights. The fixtures hummed. The refectory had four long tables arranged in rows of two. It felt cold. The fish smell of the evening meal lingered. At the back was a counter behind which stood a restaurant-sized refrigerator and stainless-steel stove. Next to containers of knives, forks, and spoons, there were cups and a half pot of coffee on a warmer. As rain lashed at the dark windows, Saul went over and poured two cups, adding non-dairy creamer and the sugarless sweetener Erika used.

He sat at the table nearest her. Reluctant, she joined him.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

“Of course, I’m
not
all right. How can you ask that?”

“I meant, are you injured?”

“Oh.” Erika looked away. “… Fine. I’m fine.”

“Except that you’re not.”

She didn’t reply.

“It’s not just
your
son who’s dead.” Saul peered down at his untasted coffee. “He was
my
son, too.”

Again, no reply.

“I hate Habib as much as you do,” Saul said. “I want to squeeze my hands around his throat and—”

“Bullshit. Otherwise,
you’d
do what
I’m
doing.”

“We lost our boy. I’ll go crazy if I lose you also. You know you’re as good as dead if you kill Habib here. For breaking the Sanction, you won’t live another day.”

“If I don’t kill Habib, I don’t
want
to live another day. Is he here?”

Saul hesitated. “So I’m told.”

“Then I’ll never get a better chance.”

“We can go to neutral ground and wait for him to leave. I’ll help you,” Saul said. “The hills around here make perfect vantage points. Will a shot from a sniper’s rifle give you the same satisfaction as seeing Habib die face-to-face?”

“As long as he’s dead. As long as he stops insulting me by breathing the same air
I
breathe.”

“Then let’s do it.”

Erika shook her head from side to side. “In Cairo, I nearly got him. He has a bullet hole in his arm to remind him. For two weeks, he ran from refuge to refuge as cleverly as he could. Then six days ago, his tactic changed. His trail became easier to follow. I told myself that he was getting tired, that I was wearing him down. But when he shifted through Mexico into the southwestern United States, I realized what he was doing. In the Middle East, he could blend. Not in Santa Fe, though. Middle Easterners are hardly ever seen. Why would he leave his natural cover? He lured me. He
wants
me to find him here. I’m sure his men are waiting for me outside right now, closing the trap. Habib can’t imagine that I’d readily break the Sanction, that I’d gladly be killed just so I could take him with me. He expects me to do the logical thing and hide among the trees outside, ready to make a move when he leaves. If I do, his men will
attack.
I’ll
be the target. Damn it, why didn’t you listen to me and stay out of this? Now
you
can’t get out of here alive any more than I can.”

“I love you,” Saul said.

Erika stared down at her clenched hands. Her angry features softened somewhat. “The only person I love more than you is … was … our son.”

A voice said, “Both of you must leave.”

Saul and Erika turned toward the now-open doorway, where Father Chen stood with his hands behind his robe. Saul had no doubt that the priest concealed a weapon.

A door farther along the refectory wall opened. The ascetic-looking priest from the reception counter stepped into the doorway. He, too, had his hands behind his robe.

Saul took for granted that the refectory had hidden microphones. “You heard Erika. Habib has a trap arranged out there.”

“A theory,” Father Chen replied. “Not proven. Perhaps she invented the theory to try to force me to let the two of you stay.”

“Habib’s an organizer for Hamas,” Erika said.

“Who or what he works for isn’t my concern. Everyone is guaranteed safety here.”

“The bastard’s a psychologist who recruits suicide bombers.” Erika glared. “He runs the damned training centers. He convinces the bombers they’ll go to paradise and fuck an endless supply of virgins if they blow themselves up along with any Jews they get near.”

“I’m aware of how suicide bombers are programmed,” Father Chen said. “But the sanctity of this Abelard safe house is all that matters to me.”

“Sanctity?” Saul’s voice rose. “What about the sanctity of our
home?
Four weeks ago, one of Habib’s maniacs snuck into our
settlement and blew himself up in a market. Our home’s near the market. Our son …” Saul couldn’t make himself continue.

“Our son,” Erika said in a fury, “was killed by a piece of shrapnel that almost cut off his head.”

“You have my sincerest and deepest sympathy,” Father Chen said. “But I cannot allow you to violate the Sanction because of your grief. Take your anger outside.”

“I will if Habib calls off his men,” Erika said. “I don’t care what happens to me, but I need to make sure nothing happens to Saul.”

Thunder rumbled.

“I’ll convey your request,” Father Chen said.

“No need.” The words came from a shadow in the corridor.

Saul felt his muscles tighten as a sallow face appeared behind Father Chen. Habib was heavy-set, with thick dark hair, in his forties, with somber eyebrows and intelligent features. He wore dark slacks and a thick sweater. His left arm was in a sling.

Keeping the priest in front of him, Habib said, “I, too, am sorry about your son. I think of victims as statistics. Anonymous casualties. How else can war be waged? To personalize the enemy is to invite defeat. But it always troubles me when I read about individuals, children, who die in the bombings.
They
didn’t take away our land.
They
didn’t institute laws that treat us as inferiors.”

“Your sympathy almost sounds convincing,” Erika said.

“When I was a child, my parents lived in Jerusalem’s old city. Israeli soldiers patrolled the top of the wall that enclosed the area. Every day, they pissed down onto our vegetable garden. Your politicians have continued to piss on us ever since.”

“Not me,” Erika said. “I didn’t piss on anybody.”

“Change conditions, give us back our land, and the bombing
will stop,” Habib said. “That way, the lives of other children will be saved.”

“I don’t care about those other children.” Erika stepped toward him.

“Careful.” Father Chen stiffened, about to pull his hands from behind his robe.

Erika stopped. “All I care about is my son.
He
didn’t piss on your vegetables, but you killed him anyhow. Just as surely as if you’d set off the bomb yourself.”

Habib studied her as a psychologist might assess a disturbed patient. “And now you’re ready to sacrifice the lives of both you and your husband in order to get revenge?”

“No.” Erika swelled with anger. “Not Saul. He wasn’t supposed to be part of this. Contact your men. Disarm the trap.”

“But if you leave here safely, you’ll take their place,” Habib said. “You’ll wait for me to come outside. You’ll attack me.”

“I’ll give you the same terms my husband gave his foster father. I’ll give you a twenty-four-hour head start.”

“Listen to yourself. You’re on the losing side, but somehow you expect me to surrender my position of strength.”

“Strength?” Erika pulled down the zipper on her rain slicker. “How’s this for strength?”

Habib gasped. Father Chen’s eyes widened. Saul took a step forward, getting close enough to see the sticks of dynamite wrapped around Erika’s waist. His pulse rushed when he saw her right thumb reach for a button attached to a detonator. She held it down.

“If anybody shoots me, my thumb goes off the button, and all of us go to heaven, except I don’t want any virgin women,” Erika said.

“Your husband will die.”

“He’ll die anyhow as long as your men are outside. But this
way, you’ll die also. How does it feel to be on the receiving end of a suicide bomb? I don’t know how long my thumb can keep pressing this button. When will my hand start to cramp?”

“You’re insane.”

“As insane as you and your killers. The only good thing about what you do is you make sure those nutcases don’t breed. For Saul, I’ll give you a chance. Get the hell out of here. Take your men with you. Disarm the trap. You have my word. You’ve got twenty-four hours.”

Habib stared, analyzing her rage. He spoke to Father Chen. “If she leaves before the twenty-four hours have elapsed …”

“She won’t.” Father Chen pulled a pistol from behind his robe.

“To help me, you’d risk being blown up?” Habib asked the priest.

“Not for you. For this safe house. I pledged my soul.”

“My thumb’s beginning to stiffen,” Erika warned.

Habib nodded. Erika and Saul followed him along the corridor to his room. Guarded by the priests, they waited while he packed his suitcase. He carried it to the reception area, moving awkwardly because of his wounded shoulder. There, he used a phone on the counter, pressing the speaker button, touching numbers with the index finger of his uninjured right arm.

Saul listened as a male voice answered with a neutral, “Hello.” Rain made a staticky sound in the background.

“I’m leaving the building now. The operation has been postponed.”

“I need the confirmation code.”

“‘Santa Fe is the City Different.’”

“Confirmed. Postponed.”

“Stay close to me. I’ll require you again in twenty-four hours.”

Habib pressed the disconnect button and scowled at Erika. “The next time, I won’t allow you to come close to me.”

Erika’s thumb trembled on the button connected to the detonator on the dynamite. She nodded toward a clock on the wall behind the reception desk. “It’s five minutes after ten. As far as I’m concerned, the countdown just started. Move.”

Habib used his uninjured right arm to open the door. Rain gusted in. “I am indeed sorry,” he told Erika. “It’s terrible that children must suffer to make politicians correct wrongs.”

He used his car’s remote control to unlock the doors from a distance. Another button on the remote control started the engine. He picked up his suitcase and stepped into the rain.

Saul watched him hurry off balance through shadowy gusts toward the car. Lightning flashed. Reflexively, Saul stepped back from the open door in case one of Habib’s men ignored the instructions and was foolish enough to shoot at an Abelard safe house.

Buffeted by the wind, Habib set down his suitcase, opened the driver’s door, shoved his suitcase across to the passenger seat, then hurried behind the steering wheel.

Father Chen closed the sanctuary’s entrance, shutting out the rain, blocking the view of Habib. The cold air lingered.

“Is that parking lot past the boundaries of the Sanction?” Erika asked.

“That isn’t important!” Father Chen glared. “The dynamite. That’s what matters.
How are we going to neutralize the bomb?”

“Simple.” Erika released her thumb from the button.

Father Chen shouted and stumbled away.

But the blast didn’t come from Erika’s waist. Instead, the roar came from outside, making Saul tighten his lips in furious satisfaction as he imagined his car and Erika’s blowing apart. The vehicles were parked on each side of Habib’s. The plastic explosives in each trunk blasted a shock wave against the safe house’s doors. Shrapnel walloped the building. A window shattered.

Father Chen yanked the entrance open. Slanting rain carried with it the stench of smoke, scorched metal, and charred flesh. Despite the storm, the flames of the gutted vehicles illuminated the night. In the middle, Habib’s vehicle was blasted inward on each side, the windows gaping, flames escaping. Behind the steering wheel, his body was ablaze.

The rumble of thunder mimicked the explosion.

“What have you done?” Father Chen shouted.

“We sent the bastard to hell where he belongs,” Erika said.

In the nearby hills, shots cracked, barely audible in the downpour.

“Friends of ours,” Saul explained. “Habib’s team won’t set any more traps.”

“And don’t worry about the authorities coming to the monastery because of the explosion,” Erika said.

A second explosion rumbled from a distance. “When our friends heard the explosion, they faked a car accident at the entrance to this road. The vehicle’s on fire. It has tanks of propane for an outdoor barbecue. Those tanks blew apart just now, which’ll explain the blasts to the authorities. Neither the police nor the fire department will have a reason to be suspicious about anything a half mile farther along this deserted road.”

By now, the flames in the cars in the parking lot were almost extinguished as the rain fell harder.